The present invention relates, in general, to a chair, and more particularly to a recliner chair.
Nothing in the following discussion of the state of the art is to be construed as an admission of prior art.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,740,031 discloses a reclining chair having a backrest which can be placed virtually against a nearby wall in a room without offering any obstruction when the chair is placed into reclining position. In other words, the backrest can be moved forwards jointly with the seat in relation to a base structure by the weight of a chair occupant. A footrest linkage mounts a footrest relative to the seat for allowing the footrest to move between a retracted position and an extended position in which the footrest projects forwardly from the seat. The footrest can hereby swing between the retracted and extended positions at an angle range of about 90°. In the retracted position, the footrest extends upright and forms a visible front wall of the chair. Such an end position of the footrest is undesired for many reasons. For one, the footrest obstructs an unrestricted comfortable use of the chair because the area underneath the seat becomes inaccessible. As a result of this inaccessibility, not only does cleaning become complicated because it requires a shift of the footrest to the extended position in order to be able to reach the area underneath the seat, but also limits design concepts.
It would therefore be desirable and advantageous to provide an improved chair to obviate prior art shortcomings.